Atlantis: Generations
by flashwitch
Summary: What if Rodney, and his kids, travelled back in time to series one? This is a future fic. Atlantis never went back to Earth. Pairings: McKay/Keller and McKay/Beckett. So, SLASH. But mild and non-explicit.
1. Prelude

**PRELUDE.**

**

* * *

**

**Hey, this is a story about time travel, new villains and cancer. It contains copious referencing to Back to the future. It's a work in progress, but I have quite a bit written already, so I should be updating fairly regularly. Enjoy. **

**

* * *

**

Rodney prepared for the mission. A science and medical team were going to a planet found by SGA2. The ancient writing on the site said something about 'the fountain of youth'. Everyone was very excited. He wasn't though. Not really. He was too worried. He was thinking about breaking up with Jennifer. He loved her, God knew he loved her. He was just worried that he might love Carson more. They were together before he met Jen. But then Carson was dead, and he did love Jen. He would never want to hurt her. He put her before himself, more than he ever did for anyone else. He knew he loved her. Then why did he find himself wanting to take Carson in his arms and hug away his sorrows?

Could he do it? Break up with her for him? He loved them both. How was he supposed to choose?

"Rodney!" A voice broke into his contemplations. He turned and found Jen standing there, fully kitted out.

"Hey, you."

"Hey." They kissed.

"You ready to go?"

"Not quite." Jen replied.

"Are you alright?" Rodney asked, the tone of her voice was disturbing.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I just need to talk to you."

"Okay. So, talk." He steeled himself. He was half giddy and half terrified. That sounded like a prelude to dumping.

"I'm... I'm pregnant."

"What?" Rodney did a fine impression of a fish.

"I'm, we're having a baby." Jen replied, smiling.

"A baby? A little boy? Or girl?" This changed everything.

"Yeah. I'm about a month and a half along."

"Wow. Just wow." Rodney leaned forward and claimed her mouth in a searing kiss. Then he frowned. "Are you sure you're okay to go on this mission?"

"Of course. Teyla went through the gate pregnant all the time. I just... I thought you should know."

"I love you." He said spontaneously, and wrapped her in his arms.

"I love you too."

He couldn't leave her. Not now. There was a tiny person inside her who would look to him for guidance. He couldn't abandon his unborn child. standing there, hugging her, he made a decision to be the best father he could be. Much better than his father was, and do whatever he could to make this child happy and healthy.

* * *

"What the-?" Rodney looked at his scanner. The readings were all over the place.

"Rodney?" John asked, hand on his gun. "Is everything alright?"

"Yeah, I just... no. No, no, no." His eyes widened as he took in the repercussions of the readings he was getting. "We need to leave now."

"What? What's wrong?"

"It's a type of radiation. Think of the Shrine we went to when my brain was being eaten. But this is a different type."

"Harmful?"

"No, not to us." Rodney had been looking around frantically, and he finally saw who he'd been looking for. "JEN!" He yelled. She was right by the alter that was the source of the radiation.

"Rodney, wait!" John called, as McKay ran towards the woman he loved. "I thought you said it couldn't hurt us!"

"It can't." He yelled back. Then he grabbed Jen's shoulders. "We have to get you out of here."

"What?" She asked, confusedly. "What's wrong?"

"There's radiation. Not in amounts that are harmful to any of us, but..."

"It could affect the foetus!" She finished the thought and dropped the sample case she was holding and let Rodney drag her towards the gate.

"Foetus?" John asked their retreating backs.

* * *

**7 and a half months later...**

"Push, lass. Just one more big one. The head's crowning."

"I HATE YOU! YOU'RE NEVER TOUCHING ME AGAIN! AARRGH!"

"Jen, just breathe, almost there, you're doing fantastic." Rodney looked down at his hand, where Jen was squeezing. He was pretty sure something was broken in it. He looked helplessly at Carson who was acting the midwife. The scot shrugged. Then with a final push a child came squalling into the world.

"It's a girl!" Carson exclaimed. "And she's a beautiful lass!" He snipped the umbilical and wrapped the girl in a blue blanket. He handed her to Rodney while he delivered the placenta.

"She's perfect." Rodney said, staring into forget-me-not blue eyes.

"Have you thought of a name yet?" Carson asked. The happy couple exchanged a look.

"Elizabeth." They said as one.

"And, we were wondering..." Rodney continued alone. "Would you... we hoped you would be her God-father?"

"God father? Me?" Carson asked, looking up from between Jen's legs.

"You'd be perfect." Jennifer smiled. Rodney gently handed her the baby.

"I'd be honoured."

* * *

**Four years later...**

"A boy! It's a boy!" Carson exclaimed, cutting the umbilical.

"A son? I have a son?" Rodney asked.

"Daddy, he's all wrinkly and gross." A little girl pouted.

"Wait till he's cleaned off, Izzie-bit. I bet he's every bit as cute as you were." Rodney smiled.

"A baby boy." Jennifer whispered, and the child was handed to her. "Hello, John Radek."

* * *

**Five years after that...**

"Daddy, I really don't feel well."

"What's up, Izzie-bit?"

"I'm tired. And I had a nose bleed when I was down in the labs."

"What? Why didn't your Uncle Radek call me about that?"

"It wasn't a big deal, but it wouldn't stop for ages."

"Hmm. Come on. Let's go see your Mother, brother and Uncle Carson in the Medical Labs."

"Well, you're a wee bit anaemic." Carson frowned looking at some results.

"That means that you don't have as many red blood cells as you should." John Radek, all of five, explained in a serious voice.

"Why?" She asked.

"Well, Izz, it could be anything. Maybe you just haven't been eating enough red meat."

"Really?"

"Yeah. But, it's unusual in a child your age." Carson frowned.

"More tests?" Jennifer asked.

"Is that really necessary?" Rodney asked. He was sitting beside Elizabeth on the gurney, and had felt her shrink into his side at the mention of more tests, and her hand clapped over the needle site.

"It would make me feel better." Jennifer frowned at her daughter.

"It won't make me feel better." Izzie frowned back. "It was just a stupid nose bleed. If I get any more symptoms, then tests, sure. But I really don't want to, and it seems a bit silly." Carson and Jennifer exchanged a long look.

"Okay. That sounds reasonable." Jen said.

"But you come straight to the infirmary at the slightest hint of anything out of the ordinary." Carson warned.

* * *

**A few days after that...**

"You're it!"

Izzie and J.R. were running around in some of the still unused corridors. They were playing Tag. Torren was watching from nearby, and he'd joined in earlier when they were playing Hide and Go Seek. Teyla's son was 12 and acted like a mini-Ronon much to the grown-ups amusement. He was good with the younger kids.

"Torren!" John Radek yelled suddenly. Torren ran over to see what was wrong, and found Elizabeth collapsed on the ground. "She was running, and then she just fell over."

"Did she hit her head?"

"No, I don't think so. It was more like she fainted." J.R. frowned. "She was poorly the other day. Her nose was bleeding, and she's anaemic. But Uncle Carson gave her iron pills. That should have made her better, and I saw her take them this morning."

"Carson? It's Torren. Izzie McKay just collapsed." Torren said into his radio. "Send help to sector b12."

* * *

"I ran some tests." Carson said. Jennifer and Rodney were sitting opposite him in his office. "I'm pretty sure she has Leukaemia."

"Leukaemia?" Rodney asked.

"Pretty sure?" Jen asked. "Shouldn't you be one hundred per cent?"

"Well, there's something a little off with the test results. It's not a recognisable form of Leukaemia. It's something new. It reminds me of some of the illnesses in children of the Genii." Carson frowned. He'd spent a year amongst the genii after the peace treaty had come through, treating them for various radiation related illnesses.

"You're saying she was exposed to radiation? When? How?" Rodney asked, looking to his wife.

"Not just radiation. A very unusual type of radiation, to create this brand new form of cancer."

"Oh, God." Jennifer suddenly paled. "The mission. When I was pregnant. We thought everything was fine, because nothing showed up right away. But..."

"Oh, yes. The mission to the fountain of youth." Carson mused. "That would do it."

"So, what's the treatment?" Rodney asked.

"Well, I think you should take her to Earth, have an oncologist examine her. They'd be better able to suggest the right treatment."

"But she's going to be okay right?" Rodney asked desperately. Carson looked down and fiddled with the file in front of him. He was having difficulty maintaining his 'doctor' persona. His emotions were getting the better of him. He swallowed heavily.

"I just don't know."

* * *

**Let me know what you think. This is just back-story to set up what I've got planned. Please Review!**


	2. Izzie's Arrival

**CHAPTER ONE. **

**IZZIE'S ARRIVAL.**

**Hey, forgot to say that SGA does not belong to me. I wish. Elizabeth and John Radek McKay are mine though. **

**This is the first real chapter. I figured I should post it already because that way, you'll see where I'm going with this.**

**

* * *

**

"Really Carson, it's actually very simple." McKay said condescendingly as he tried to explain his latest idea to Dr Beckett.

"As you say Rodney, I'm sure it is, but you lost me when you got the bit about inverting the flow of the what-cha-ma-call-it." The Scottish doctor replied.

They were in Rodney's lab, standing at the counter on which countless gadgets and oddities were strewn. Carson reached out a single finger and lightly touched the scientist's latest project, while McKay's back was turned. There was instantly a flash of light, bright and almost blinding. Beckett pulled his hand back with shocking speed.

"What did you do?" McKay turned on his friend.

"Nothing!" he replied, with his hands in the air. "I didn't do anything."

"Well, obviously you did something..."Rodney began, but was interrupted by a little voice.

"Daddy?" It said.

The two men turned as one to find a young girl of about thirteen standing there. She was staring at them as she weaved unsteadily on her feet. "It didn't work. Why didn't it work?" She asked plaintively. Her unfocused eyes found the doctor. "Uncle Carson? No one told me you were back in Atlantis!" she grinned and then toppled over in a dead faint. The two men stared at each other, completely taken aback.

"Uncle Carson?" Rodney asked snidely.

"Daddy?" His friend responded. Then, Carson's doctor instincts kicked in and he ran around the counter to the girl's side. He put two fingers to her throat to check her pulse, and found that her heart was still beating strongly.

"Rodney, help me get her to the infirmary. Poor child has fainted!"

Rodney came around to help Carson lift the girl, but before he did so, he put his hand to his earpiece.

"Dr Weir, Major Shepherd, meet me in the infirmary, as soon as possible." He said into it abruptly.

* * *

Soon, in the infirmary, Dr Weir and Major Shepherd were being briefed.

"And she just appeared there, in your lab?" Dr Weir asked.

"Yes, there was this flash of light. And poof! There she was." Rodney replied.

"Aye, and that's not the strange part," added Carson.

"It's not?" Shepherd asked, glancing at Teyla and Lieutenant Ford who had tagged along, "Because it seems pretty weird to me!"

"Well, the really odd part is that she knew us. She called me Uncle Carson, and..." he said this with obvious glee. "She called Rodney 'Daddy'!" they all turned and stared at McKay, who frowned embarrassedly.

"It's gotta be some kind of mistake." Ford frowned.

"Yes, yes, yes." McKay replied exasperated, but before he could continue, the girl stirred. She was tucked into one of the hospital beds and had only been unconscious about half an hour.

"Mom, mom is that you?" she murmured as they rushed over to her side.

"No, sweetheart, only me." Dr Beckett replied, gently.

"Uncle Carson, what happened?" She asked, rubbing sleepily at her eyes. She was a pretty little thing, just on the edge of childhood, with short dark blond hair.

"You fainted, my lovely." Carson told her. "Can you tell me your name?"

"Izzie-Bit" she smiled. "Elizabeth..." she trailed off. "Did I hit my head?"

"No, no, you just fainted." Colonel Sheppard replied quickly at her worry.

"But you don't ask those questions when someone faints. That's a hit on the head question." Her expression clouded. "Which means that you actually needed to know my name. Which means ..." She clicked her fingers rapidly, three times, suddenly sitting bolt upright. "It worked! I knew it had to work! I knew it!" Then her face fell again, and she slumped back into the pillows. "But on me, not Daddy, which means that I've gone back in time." She shrugged. "Obviously."

"Excuse me?" Carson and Elizabeth Weir asked as one.

"What?" John added.

"What?" Rodney joined with the general sentiment.

"Oh, this is not good, very not good!" She began to breathe quickly, panicking, her hands twisting in the blanket laid over her. "I told him not to! I said it was a stupid plan!"

Dr Weir came and sat next to her on the edge of the bed. She gently reached out and stopped her fidgeting hands.

"It's okay. Elizabeth? That's a pretty name. My names Elizabeth too." The woman smiled. "Elizabeth Weir."

"60 % of all girls are called Elizabeth. I was named after another one, you in fact." She laughed a little hysterically.

"You were named after me?"

"Yeah. People call me Izzie." She chewed her bottom lip. "This is not good. Just by being here I could be screwing things up royally. I need to get back." She frowned in concentration and then her face became panicked again. "Oh shi...také mushrooms." She corrected herself with a covert glance at McKay.

"What is it?" Teyla asked her, wondering what was so upsetting their young visitor.

"Well, I'm not supposed to be here. My dad was the one who was going to go back in time, so he had the beacon. Not me. Which means that I have no way of getting home. I'm stuck here."

The kid looked close to tears. There was a moment of silence and then Teyla took the girl's hand in hers.

"What do you mean? Are you sure that you cannot get home?" she asked.

"Dad had the beacon. Without it I have no way to contact my own time or get home. Which is really bad, because every second I stay here, I could be changing things which shouldn't be changed. I'm risking altering my own time." She managed a faded grin. "Heck, the next thing you know I'll be on stage singing 'Jonny be good' while my hand disappears."

"I love that movie!" John grinned.

"I know." The kid replied. Then she mouthed along with Rodney's response.

"Oh don't get me started!" he groused.

"So, how far in the future are you from?" Aiden Ford asked curiously, with his infectious smile. The girl hadn't really paid him any mind before. But now, she noticed him and for the first time she seemed truly uncomfortable.

"Sorry, who are you?" She asked shyly. "I mean no offense, but I recognise the others..." she tilted her head interrogatively.

"Oh." He frowned at the implication. "I'm Lieutenant Aiden Ford, miss."

"You're Aiden Ford!" she sat up again, excited. "Wow, my dad used to tell me bedtime stories about you!" She looked a little upset still but shook it off. "You left Atlantis before I was born."

Aiden perked right up to hear that they told stories about him in the future (Of course, she hadn't recognised Weir until she'd confirmed her identity, but she had a suspicion. Ford on the other hand was the Atlantis equivalent of the bogeyman).

* * *

Dr Weir motioned them away from the girl's bed and as they gathered at the other end of the infirmary, Zelenka walked in.

He joined their discussion.

"What is this? I hear that a child appeared in Rodney's lab?" He questioned in his strong Czech accent.

"Where did you hear that?" Rodney asked annoyed.

"From Miller. He heard it from some marine who heard it from Bates' second in command who heard it from Peter who knows everything that happens here." Radek replied.

"Hmmm, I didn't realise that we had such an efficient system of gossip already." McKay mused.

"Yes Radek, it's true. We're just trying to decide what to do with her." Weir told him.

"Where on Earth did she come from?" Zelenka asked.

"Don't you mean where on Atlantis?" Rodney snarked.

"The future." Teyla replied.

"Or so she claims." Shepherd added.

"So, what are we going to do with her?" Weir asked the group as a whole.

"Oh, come on Elizabeth! She's just a little girl!" McKay exclaimed. He couldn't see what harm a thirteen year old girl could do.

"If we've learned anything in this job, it's that appearances can be deceiving." Dr Weir replied.

"Truthfully, the girl could be some sort of Wraith trick." Teyla added.

"McKay, is this personal?" Shepherd asked with a smirk. "I mean, she did call you Daddy!"

"What?" Zelenka asked quickly, a smirk of his own growing.

"Oh, thank you for reminding me! No, I just think that we should give the thirteen year old girl benefit of the doubt!" Rodney responded.

"She called you daddy?" Radek grinned.

"I'm with McKay on this one." Aiden added his support. "Which I don't say very often."

"Aye, Elizabeth, she's just a wee lassie." Carson agreed.

"Yes, I know. But what if she's not?" Dr Weir responded.

"Excuse me?" Aiden asked, quirking an eyebrow.

"I understand Dr Weir's perspective." Teyla said. "As leader of Atlantis, she must be cautious. She has to put the wellbeing of everyone on this base before the rights of one child, not even from here, as much as it pains me to admit it."

"Yeah, we have no proof of this girl's story, and if I were the bad guys, I might send a kid with a cool story to distract and spy." John replied.

"Humour me." Weir ordered. "We'll put her in one of the isolation rooms. Carson, I want you to run as many tests as you can think of, make sure she's human."

* * *

They turned and headed back to the girl. She grinned as she recognised the Czech, and gave him a little wave. She spoke directly to her namesake.

"I think you should put me in an isolation room, minimize my contact to minimize the damage. If I do nothing, then I can't screw up too much, right?" Radek, McKay, Aiden and the others couldn't help but smile as the child pre-empted their great leader.

"Good idea." Weir replied with just a hint of irony. "Would you mind if Dr Beckett here ran a few tests on you?"

"Why?" the girl's eyes went flinty and hard all of a sudden.

"Just so we're sure what we're dealing with. It's just a precaution, you understand." Shepherd replied.

"NO." Izzie answered. She stuck out her lower lip.

"It's nothing to worry about." Radek told her.

"Yeah, a few harmless tests." Rodney added.

"NO!" she folded her arms across her chest.

"It's alright my dear. I promise it won't hurt." Carson reassured her, secretly wondering what she had to hide.

"You don't believe me." They could hear the tears in her voice. "You don't trust me."

"No!" Aiden replied quickly. "It's not that we don't believe you..."

"It's that they don't." McKay finished helpfully, pointing out the advocates for shutting her in an isolation room.

"Please!" She appealed to them. "I... I really, I don't want to be poked and prodded. I hate being tested."

"If you're telling the truth, which I'm sure you are, you have nothing to worry about." Carson reasoned. "And it really won't hurt."

"You always say..." She trailed off and shook her head. "I've had enough tests to last me a lifetime." She mumbled.

"Well, I'm afraid you don't have much choice in the matter young lady. We need to be sure, so you will go, with Carson and these Marines, to the isolation room. You will submit to any tests Dr Beckett feels necessary. We need to know you're safe. If you are telling the truth, you may have brought weird futuristic contagions back with you, which we would have no defence against." Weir told her, motioning two marines by the door into the room. "And if you're lying, we need to know."

"I'm thirteen years old. What am I going to do?" Was the child's response. She batted her lashes and smiled.

* * *

**Please, please, please review!**


	3. Stranger in a Strange Land

**Chapter 2. **

**Stranger in a Strange Land.**

**This chapter contains several Heinlein references, if you haven't read his books, you should, but also you might not get some references. **

**

* * *

**

Dr Weir was in her office several hours later. She was looking over a mission report. Carson knocked on the frame of her door, for which the term 'always open' was invented.

"I hope I'm not interrupting."

"Carson, no, please, come in."

"Well, the good news is that she is definitely human." Beckett told her.

"I take it from your tone, that there is also bad news?" Elizabeth asked, putting her tablet down on the desk before her.

"Well, I thought you'd want to see this." He fiddled with a tablet of his own, but did not continue.

"What is it?" she asked. He handed her the tablet so she could see the results.

"She has cancer. Leukaemia to be exact, and it seems to be pretty far along."

"What?" Weir asked, shocked. "How long?"

"Well, it's difficult to say, but months left, not years." Carson shook his head. "Poor girl. She's barely even lived yet." There was several seconds of silence and then Carson shook himself. "But that isn't the main thing I wanted to show you." He reached for the tablet and she handed it back. He scrolled to the next page. "I've detected some sort of radiation, a type I've never seen before. Either she was exposed to inordinate amounts, or she is exuding it herself."

"Radiation... do you think it caused the cancer? Or maybe it's to treat it?" Weir suggested.

"I couldn't rule either one out."

"Did you do a paternity test?" She half joked.

"No, even if she is Rodney's daughter, what would it prove? But, she does have the ATA gene."

"Really? That's interesting."

"Anyway, I'd better get back. Rodney wants to do a load of IQ tests and the like. And I want to ask her about the cancer."

"Okay, go ahead, but keep me in the loop, alright?"

"You _are_ the loop, Elizabeth." He replied good naturedly and turned to leave.

"Carson." Her voice stopped him. "If she is Rodney's daughter and she's dying of cancer..."

"Aye, I know. Who else would invent a time machine to save his daughter?"

* * *

Carson had a lot to think about. To be honest, he hadn't run the DNA test because he was scared. He didn't want the girl to be Rodney's daughter. Because she'd called him Uncle Carson. Which meant she knew him and Rodney wasn't with him in the future. He really didn't want to think about that.

He and McKay had been together since they had arrived here in Atlantis, and they'd been good friends for two years before that. Then they'd found out that they were both bi, after a night of heavy drinking and heavier confessions. But Rodney had been terrified of being with a man. Too many years working with the American military,with their ridiculous rules. After their first night together, Carson had found his bed empty, and it had taken a long time, and an order from Elizabeth to get Rodney to stop avoiding him. They'd talked and it had taken a lot from Carson to convince him that it was okay for them to be together. Dr Beckett had worried that Rodney would leave him ever since.

Oh well, no rest for the wicked. He could worry about it later.

* * *

Izzie sat alone in the isolation room, well aware that Major Shepherd and his team were watching her from the observation deck. She had her legs curled up under her on one of the pair of chairs. She didn't mind them watching, that was understandable caution, the team in her time would have done the same. She was a threat to them, at least she could be perceived as such. She pulled her legs up so her chin could rest on her knees, and sighed. She missed _her_ people. The John Shepherd who would sweep her up into his arms and spin her around. The Teyla who helped her through her first crush. And the Rodney McKay who she could call father. Not to mention the people who weren't even there yet; Ronon, Samantha Carter, Woolsey. Her mother.

But, she didn't have the beacon, and without it, her chances of getting home were ridiculously low, even the most inveterate gambler wouldn't bet on those odds. Maybe she could rig a beacon, but with the level of technology in this temporal backwater made it unlikely to succeed. And there was no way she would cannibalize the few pieces of tech she'd brought back with her.

Then a thought made her smile and she reached into her pocket and pulled a small sphere from it. It was about the size of a baseball and was metallic. She threw it up into the air, and instead of coming down into her awaiting hand, it hung there, in thin air. It began to glow, slowly getting brighter, looking very much like Tinkerbell.

"Eve." The girl said.

"Hey Boss, got a job for me, huh, Boss?" the orb spoke in the voice of a small girl.

"Naw, just wanted to check in." Then a thought occurred to her. "Evie girl, what does your internal chronometer say?"

The orb began to dart around in complex patterns, a stunning aeronautical display, avoiding answering the question.

In the observation deck, Rodney asked the question on everybody's minds.

"What, what is that?"

"I don't know what Rodney, why don't you ask it?" John replied sarcastically.

"Eve, what does your internal chronometer say?" Izzie asked again.

"Hey Boss, I know, why don't we play a game, a fun game, maybe hide-and-go-seek?"

"Eve, I ask you three times." Izzie said sternly and formally. "What does your internal chronometer say?" she frowned; usually her friend/assistant was more forthcoming than this.

"Boss-lady, I tell you three times. I do not know." The orb hated to admit when she didn't have the answers.

"Hmmm, some kind of temporal EMP must have wiped your circuits when we came through."

"Don't panic, Boss, I am grokking the data, and will have the answer soon."

"Don't worry about it, junior. Home Eve." The orb returned to her outstretched palm and she slipped it back in her pocket.

Carson entered, having returned from his discussion with Elizabeth.

"Hello there," he smiled and came to sit on the second chair, opposite her. "The tests revealed something very interesting."

"Let me guess," she replied dryly. "I have cancer."

"Yes. I just wanted to be sure...how long have you know?"

"I was diagnosed when I was nine."

"Is that why you came back here?"

"Indirectly. It's why my dad wanted to get back here. I remember the first time you told me I had cancer." She smiled, wistfully, remembering the day like it was yesterday, and it wasn't all that different, really. "Maybe things don't change all that much after all."

"Izzie, how did you get back here? Did your daddy invent the time machine?"

"Daddy? He helped, but it was my invention, based on the work of an ancient. It was my idea, my machine, but it was daddy who came up with this stupid plan, he was the one who wanted to come back here. I wanted to go and see everything. I mean, can you imagine watching the pyramids being built? Or finding out who was on the grassy knoll?" the girls eyes lit up as she spoke, but then she frowned. "But daddy, he just wants to fix everything! He's like that. I love him and everything, but he can get so intense sometimes. And when I told him I was working on a time machine, the first thing he said, the _first _thing, was 'great, now we can go back and stop it, fix it. Cure you.' Don't get me wrong, I want to be cured, but not like this. Not at the possible expense of my entire life." She shook her head. "He just can't see that by 'fixing' me he's really changing everything, changing me. Do I want to die? Heck no! But this isn't the way. Not that he'll ever listen to me, he's my dad, that's all that matters to him. To him, I'm just his daughter. It's worse for J.R., my brother. I mean, we know he loves us but... he just cares about the cancer more." She frowned; she hadn't meant to tell him that. "If daddy changes too much, I might never even be born. Sometimes I wonder if that's what he wants, if he thinks it would be better with no daughter than a defective one." Her voice was filled with bitter emotion, all of it useless. "And now, I'm stuck back here, and everything I do could be screwing up the continuum royally, I mean just by telling you this, I could be changing my whole life!" She burst into noisy, undignified tears.

"Here now, sweetheart. Don't take on so." He put his arm around her and, for a second, she let herself fall into his embrace. Then she pulled away, sniffing as she drew back into herself.

As she gave a sad, somehow wistful smile, Dr Rodney McKay walked in. He had heard everything and he decided to come down, on the pretence of doing mental acuity tests on the child, to get Carson to let the girl alone. He saw her sitting there, looking at Carson, with tears drying on her face and frowned.

"Carson, why don't we give the kid a break?" he suggested. Shepherd had joined him in the doorway, having come down from observation when he saw her get upset.

"Yeah, I bet you're hungry. I remember always being hungry when I was your age. How about me and the guys head over to the mess and see what edibles they got?"

"I... "She glanced at the sheaf of papers in Rodney's hands. Carson noticed the direction of her gaze.

"It's alright, cherub, we can take a quick break, get you fed and then Rodney can subject you to his mind tests." He widened his eyes at her comically, and she couldn't help but laugh. It was a sweet sound, akin to the tinkling of bells. John ruffled her hair with a grin and then the three men left together. She was alone. She frowned and pulled her legs up so she was sitting cross legged on one of the chairs. Izzie was thinking about the how the more things change; the more things stay the same. It was bizarre, seeing people long dead or at least long gone, in her time. And it was weirder seeing Atlantis as it had been when it was first discovered. She thought of the people she considered her family, and then her thoughts drifted from them -Shepherd, Ronon, Teyla- to her actually family. Her mother, Jennifer Keller. Her father, Dr McKay. And her baby brother, John Radek. Here, her parents hadn't even met yet. Everything was wrong. They were still at war with the Wraith, for crying out loud!

* * *

Dr McKay came in then, interrupting her musings. He carried with him a plate piled high with junk food; it would probably make her mother wince to see it, and a stack of papers.

"Here you go. I wasn't sure what children like to eat, but Shepherd assured me that this was appropriate." He offered her the food and then pulled it back, hesitating. "You don't have any allergies, do you?" he asked, craftily.

"I do, but I know what food from the mess is safe." She replied, taking the plate. She certainly wasn't going to tell him that she was allergic to citrus, just like him. If she told him that, then he'd know about being her father and then he'd ask awkward questions. Questions she couldn't answer without risk. She fiddled with the junk food, moving around on the plate.

"Hmm." He frowned, his cunning plan foiled. He had no choice left but to ask if he wanted the answer. "Earlier... when you got here... you called me... well, you know." He trailed off. It was hard to reconcile this egotistical, yet strangely shy man and his conniving ways with her brave and confident father.

"Actually I don't." Was her response.

"Excuse me?" he replied.

"Well, you said "you know". But I don't, I was disoriented, by the temporal shift." She replied.

"Oh." He looked disappointed. Before they could explore this avenue further, however, a strange beeping and buzzing emitted from Izzie's pocket. Then, the orb flew out and hovered up in the air by its owner's head.

"Eve!" She exclaimed, surprised at the behaviour of her friend. Carson came in then, and the globe darted at his face, flew a loop around his head, still letting off that shrill beep.

"What in heaven's name?" Carson asked, shocked.

"Yes, what is that?" Rodney frowned.

"Eve. Stop that racket and introduce yourself." The girl ordered. The noise did stop.

"Sorry, Boss. Proximity alert!" the orb replied.

"What? But that's impossible." Izzie said half to herself. "Where?"

"Here. In Atlantis, only a few hundred metres away! My systems are still reeling from the jump, but I've rolled the dice. Control room, Boss."

"Not good, very not good." She muttered.

"Why don't you tell us what is going on here, eh?" Rodney interjected.

"This is E.V.E. She was one of my first inventions. The Electronic Virtual Entity, she's an A.I. with a difference. She has a whole personality to herself, and a mind of her own. She's sensed something. A thing from our own time, that has no business being here, and how it came to be here I don't know... unless, it must have waylaid our singularity! Grabbed onto our jump."

"What is it?" Dr Beckett asked. "The thing that's come back?"

"I can't tell you." She frowned. "If you know about them now, then you may never know about them, if you take my meaning."

"Sorry, but I think that 'them' destroying us now, would be worse." Rodney said snidely.

"Look, just go away, and let me think about this for a while, I can fix this, I know I can." She frowned and turned to the orb, chewing on the ends of her hair as she thought. The two men exchanged a long look and both of them came to the decision to talk to Elizabeth Weir as one.

"Okay, Izzie, we'll leave you be for now." Carson told her, she barely glanced up, and then the two men left.

* * *

Rodney and Carson headed straight to Dr Weirs office where they found Shepherd, Teyla, Aiden had beaten them to it, having been watching them in the observation deck. Radek was there too, Dr Weir having called him there to see if the sensors had detected anything.

"Rodney, Carson, what do you think?" Dr Weir asked. "Is she serious, or setting us up?"

"Elizabeth, I really don't see why she would lie, she seems genuinely upset." Carson answered.

"I have to agree with Carson. The kid was close to panicking." Rodney added.

"She didn't seem to be all that upset from where we were sitting." Ford grinned. "For all we know, she's trying to make us chase our tails."  
"She did respond brusquely towards the two of you." Teyla said, tilting her head.

"There was nothing on the sensors." Radek contributed.  
"And she refused to explain." John added.

"Yes, yes, yes. But that is completely understandable." Rodney replied. At their blank looks, he continued. "Look, I'll try to put this as simply as possible, so that you can comprehend. She created a separate future the second she travelled back in time. And now? She is trying her hardest to keep the new future as close to hers as possible." They still looked confused. "It's like those God awful movies you love so much." He directed that comment at Shepherd. "The ones with the time travelling DeLorean. In the second film, they go home to a future that was very different from the one they left, just because of a stupid betting book. Now, if she tells us everything she is trying hard not to..." McKay trailed off suggestively, spreading his hands.

"And Biff will end up married to her mom." Shepherd nodded.

"Exactly, wait, what?" Rodney answered quickly, confusing himself.

"We'll have to weigh the costs and benefits, will it do more harm for her to tell us, or not?" Weir responded.

* * *

Meanwhile, back in the isolation room, a breakout was in progress. Izzie had carefully positioned the chairs and table to block out the view of the observers. She quickly removed a panel on the wall by the door, and began to hotwire the crystals.

"Er, Boss? What are you up to?" her glow globe asked.

"Evie, I'm making strawberry ice cream, what does it look like?" She snarked. Then immediately felt bad. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be mean. I'm breaking out of Iso, is all."

"But Boss... really scary, evil, scary, bad, time altering, scary, evil thing out there. Nice safe room in here, and it's locked too." Eve replied in that Duh tone of voice you reserve for when someone makes a really monumentally stupid idea.

"Eve. Really scary etcetera evil out there, with a bunch of people who have no clue as to what it is or how to fight it. Me in here, where I, the only one who has a snowballs chance in hell of fighting the really scary evil, can't do anything to help. Sound good to you?"

" But... Boss? Why is it always us?"

"Just lucky I guess." She turned back to the crystals and the doors opened. "We is out of here." the orb didn't move towards the door with her.

"Do you want seven reasons?" Izzie asked her, her eyes darting to the observation deck. Luckily the guards they'd set on her were playing cards and hadn't noticed anything yet.

"Can we just discuss options here?" Eve asked. "I mean, really scary evil!"

"Okay, on the one hand, we stay in here and let everyone we care about get killed, including my dad so we're never born. On the other hand, we tell them about the Phage and they try and stop it, but the knowledge changes the future so we're never born. On the gripping hand, we go out there, stop the bad guy, save the day, and hopefully get home safe before we are temporally screwed!" there was a brief pause.

"You may have a point there Boss-lady."

"Open sesame." Izzie whispered ironically. And the two companions headed out the open door. They tip-toed stealthily down the corridor. Then the alarms started to wail.

"Erm, Boss?" Eve asked in her little girl voice. "Really scary evil or burley marines chasing you?"

"That isn't the Iso alarm. It's the self destruct siren." She shook her head. "The Phage must have infiltrated the system."

"So, when in danger or in doubt, run in circles scream and shout!" Eve giggled.

"We have to get to the control room, figure this out." Izzie replied.

"Then run faster, not slower." The orb gave the girl a series of quick prods in the lower back and the chase began again, this time they wasted no time hiding from view. They dashed full pelt down the corridor, barely avoiding collisions.

* * *

"It's not accepting my code." Shepherd said worriedly as he typed furiously.

"Rodney!" Dr Weir yelled, typing in her own code for the third time, with no effect.

"Give me a minute here!" he typed furiously, watching the read-out. His face fell suddenly and he paled. "Oh no!"

"What?" Elizabeth asked.

"No, no, no, no, no!" he added.

"What Rodney?" John asked him forcing his voice to be calm.

"I'm locked out of the system." His expression was panicked. "There is nothing I can do."

"Dial the gate." Weir told Radek who was beside McKay. "We'll evacuate." Radek opened his mouth to respond but before he could...

"You don't seem to understand. When I say 'locked out of the system' I mean exactly that. We are locked out of the ENTIRE system. We can't dial the gate." Rodney told her.

"How much time do we have?" Ford asked, nervously.

"No way to know for sure. It's up to the person who sets the destruct." Radek replied quietly.

"So, death is inevitable?" Teyla made it into a question.

"No!" Shepherd exclaimed, and everyone turned to him. "We load everyone into the jumpers, fly people to the mainland."

"Good, we can try. Put me on the P.A." she ordered Chuck.

"LOCKED OUT OF THE SYSTEM!" Rodney repeated loudly.

"Well, how are we supposed to get everyone onto the jumpers if we can't tell them to get onto the jumpers?" Shepherd asked. Silence met that question. Then, it changed to literal silence as the alarm suddenly stopped clanging.

"What just happened?" Aiden asked.

"I, I don't..." Rodney replied. "It's stopped! The self destruct has just stopped." They all looked around, trying to find an explanation. That explanations name was Izzie. She was down on her hands and knees by an open panel, having removed a key crystal, and rewired the system to abort the self destruct.

"Dr Weir!" a voice came over the radio, not as effective as the city wide communications system, but as human tech, more reliable. "The girl, she escaped isolation in the ruckus."

Aiden was the one who noticed the child down by the stairs to the gate-room, crystal in hand, grinning at a job well done. He pointed her out and she was instantly surrounded by marines, all with their weapons pointed directly at the girl.

"Step away from the crystals." Shepherd told her seriously.

"Hey, be nice to the Boss," Eve told them. "She just saved all your collective butts."

"Do you even have any idea what you're doing?" Rodney growled, snatching the crystal from her outstretched hand. "You could have blown us to kingdom come!"

"You were already going to be blown up, and it's not like I could get it wrong! I was born in the infirmary, grew up here in Atlantis. Earth isn't home to me; it's a nice place to visit. I've known this sequence since I was five years old, when I accidentally set off a chain reaction. My dad sat up with me all night until I knew it by heart." She smiled wistfully. "He said if I was old enough to destroy the city, I was old enough to learn how to save it."

"For Christ's sake! Would you please lower you weapons?" Carson exclaimed, "She's a thirteen year old girl!" The soldiers shuffled uncomfortably, but they kept their guns aimed at the child. Then Shepherd turned to Weir, who nodded once. He began to lower his weapon, but before he could give the order for the others to comply there was a flash of blinding white light and a voice came from the direction of the gate, and a man appeared.

"Why are you all pointing guns at my daughter?"

* * *

**So, what do you think so far? **


	4. McKay, McKay and Izzie

**Hey, I'm back, with the next chapter. Enjoy. **

**Oh, the slash begins in this one, but nothing explicit, just a hint of it. No actual sex.  
I don't own Atlantis. **

**

* * *

**

Everyone turned around to face the source of the voice and found an older, disoriented looking Dr McKay. They stared at the man before them, confused. He actually didn't look all that different from the Rodney McKay they all knew well.

"Daddy!" Izzie exclaimed and ran to his arms. Luckily, the soldiers were too taken aback by the new arrival to shoot her as she dashed across. As she hugged the man, he swayed on his feet and then collapsed.

"Daddy! What's wrong?" The girl got to her knees and checked him over.

There was a muffled thump from the back of the group staring at the new arrival. Young Doctor McKay had also collapsed.

They were both rushed to the infirmary, and the girl went with them. Carson, overcoming his shock, checked them over and then went to fill out some paper work that was overdue. Shepherd and Ford were standing at the end of their McKay's bed and glanced over at the other McKay. They watched Teyla comfort the girl who was sitting by her father's bed.

So," Shepherd said to Ford. "McKay with a kid?"

"Yeah. Weird huh?" Aiden replied.

"What I can't get my head around is the idea that McKay is going to sleep with a woman at some point in the future." John smirked. Ford smiled back then replied.

"I just never thought any of us would have kids. I was even starting to think we'd never get home."  
"Don't be so pessimistic, Ford." His CO replied. "That's an order." Teyla came over to them, leaving the girl with her father, to look down at the scientist.

"The older McKay looks almost identical to our McKay." She observed. "We need a way to tell the Rodney's apart."

John grinned.

* * *

Izzie spent the night in the infirmary, between her two fathers. The Rodney's slept all the way through. The girl stirred restlessly, lost in dreams. Carson frowned. He had noticed her restlessness and had checked her vitals. She was spiking a fever, not a high one, but in a child with Leukaemia... He kept his eye on her, and luckily, her temperature was down by the morning. When he asked her about it, she shrugged.

"I get them quite a lot." She didn't elaborate that it was a side effect of being off the pain killers, anti-nausea drugs, sleeping pills, stimulants, and everything else they gave her to make her last month's more bearable. They'd given up on the chemo.

McKay the elder woke up first.

"What happened?" he asked, confusedly.

"Temporal backlash." His daughter grinned. "Same thing knocked me out cold."

"What about him... me?" he gestured to the younger man in the next bed.

"Meredith? He fainted!" The girl replied with unsuppressed glee.

"Oh, come on, there has to be a better word! A more..." McKay the Elder trailed off, gesturing.

"A more macho word?" her head was tilted to one side. "You know it's the proper medical term, and any way, a wimpish word for a wimpish thing to do."

"Why was I so worried about you?" Her father asked her. "You're obviously fine; your sarcasm seems to be working perfectly."

"I learned from the best." She sniped.

"So, how do you like it back here? I bet it was weird seeing all of us so young. Was I... the younger me...?"

"Meredith," she put him out of his misery. "He's Meredith. Yes, he was nice, not as nice as you though."

"When are we?"

"About two months after colonisation." She took a deep breath, steeling herself. "But, Daddy, there's something I need to tell you."

"What is it?" he asked, immediately alert.

She looked so sad, standing there by his bed, twisting her hands as she looked at her feet. He would have carried on, reassured her, but at that second, Meredith, stirred. He came too slowly, and sat up, to find himself staring at his own face. Carson came over, seeing his patients were now both awake.

"So, Rodneys, how are we feeling?"

"Mmm, a little nauseous..." They both said as one, and trailed off as they realised they were speaking in unison.

"Well, all your vitals check out," Carson replied, pretending not to notice that they had spoken as one.

"Hey, what the... what is this thing on my arm?" Meredith asked, noticing a neon pink band around his upper arm.

"We needed a way to tell the elder from the younger, Rodney, you should be glad that you still look as young as you do now." Carson said.

McKay the elder was frowning confusedly at the doctor. He put his hand on the girls forearm and she nodded once. She knew how he was feeling. That he was thinking of his best friend, and his clone. The suffering he went through, 2 years in Michael's jail. He could spare him all that pain with a few words... irrevocably changing the course of events. But she knew the next thought that would go through his head, 'what about the exploding tumour?' He could save Carson originals life by telling him about that, and save the clone, who he saw as equal in every way to the first version, from suffering, but then there might be two of them, or none, or... the permutations were endless. What she didn't know, couldn't know, was that this Carson was dating that Meredith. They'd been together since Earth. Rodney was part of the reason Carson came to Atlantis, and Carson was the main source of improvement in Rodney's temperament. Poor Carson was having a really tough time of it, with the evidence that their relationship wouldn't last staring him in the face.

"Well, why do I have to have the stupid pink band on _my_ arm?" Meredith groused. Rodney glanced at his younger self and smiled. He remembered being that petty, he still was sometimes.

"I see no reason to keep either," the girl coughed and Beckett smiled at her, "_any_ of you, here in the Infirmary. But older McKay and Izzie, you will both have to go to an isolation room. And Elizabeth asked me to tell you that security was going to be stepped up this time. Guards outside the door."

"Okay, I promise I won't escape again." She responded, suitably contrite, as he smiled and walked away, she continued under her breath. "Unless I have a really good reason."

"You escaped from Iso? Young lady, that is not acceptable behaviour!"

"Daddy! I had no choice."

"There is always a choice, Elizabeth. You know that."

They were led off to the isolation room, bickering.

* * *

They left Meredith with Carson, who immediately found something interesting to look at on the floor.

"Carson..."

"No, Rodney." The doctor pulled back from the hand offering comfort. "I need some time to think about this."

"NO!" Rodney looked almost desperate. Before Carson, the only person who even looked at him like he mattered for anything apart from his intelligence was his sister, who treated him with derision more often than not. "I love you. That... they don't change any of that! Maybe she's adopted, maybe..."

"Maybe a lot of things. But I need to think about this, and I think you do too." Carson smiled sadly and left his lover alone on the hospital bed.

"Damn it!" Rodney smacked his hand into the bed rail. This was the last thing he and Carson needed. They hadn't had an easy time of it, with his insecurities, and Carson's self esteem issues. Not to mention all the homophobes in the American military thanks to Don't Ask, Don't Tell. They were finally a real partnership, they knew where they stood and they were happy. And now this. This could break them.

* * *

As soon as Rodney Senior and Izzie were left alone, well, as alone as you can get when there are people watching from the observation deck, her father embraced the girl.

"Izz, I was so worried about you! What went wrong?"

"I don't know, I must have left something out of my equations." She frowned.

"Well, we'll sort it out when we get home. Your mother was ready to shoot me when she heard what had happened, and your brother has been worrying himself sick. We'll soon be back with them."

"Daddy, I don't want you to do this."

"I know. My memory, it's... twinned, I guess is the word. I remember how it happened the first time, but I also remember everything that's happened since you came back here. It stopped when I came back after you, but I bet it changes again when we go back to the future."

"You mean...?"

"Yes. I heard everything young Meredith has heard earlier. For instance when you told Carson...everything you said when he told you about the cancer. I want to look after you, make you better, happy. But, if letting you die makes you happy, then I honestly don't know what to do."

"I don't want to die. But I like my life. I enjoy every moment. Atlantis is my home, my family is here. If you change what happens here, then what happened in my life might change too. I might not even be born."

"Sweetheart, I'd be careful..."

"What did young Meredith think when he heard what I had to say?"

"He... for the first time since you appeared in his office, he seriously hoped that he wasn't your father."

"We can talk about this later." She said, shaking her head as she came to her senses. "There's something more important."

"What could be more important than my little girl?"

"Daddy!" She narrowed her eyes. "Listen to me. There's at least one Phage here."

"What!"

"It jumped my temporal shift. Another one probably came back with you."

"Damn it! How is it even possible? There would have to be one in my lab for that to happen, but we scan daily, there's no way there's any in our Atlantis!"

"The time jump takes us into subspace... I think they jumped our singularity. I'm sorry, it's my fault, I should have taken them into account... I must have missed something in my equations."

" Wonderful." He rolled his eyes, knowing that she was as upset as he would be if he screwed up with the science.

"What are we going to do?"

"What are we going to do? Save the day, rescue our friends and live happily ever after of course!"

"Oh, I _do_ love you Daddy!" The girl laughed.

* * *

****


	5. Radiation Wellness

**Radiation Wellness. **

**Author's Note: Since there is no TV in Atlantis, Izzie grew up watching boxsets of old TV shows, mostly sci-fi, but one of the Marines had a survival fetish and was obsessed with MacGyver. Boy, did Izzie have a surprise when General O'Neill came to visit...**

**

* * *

**

The two McKay's set to plotting.

"What tech did you bring back with you?" Rodney asked his daughter.

"My comm, a couple of hover disks, and of course Eve. Just whatever was in my pocket. How about you?"

"I've got my comm, the Beacon, and... well, that's it."

"I feel like we're in an episode of MacGyver! How are we supposed to make an anti-phage weapon out of that without giving everything away to the counterparts?"

"Why don't you start by telling me exactly what happened earlier in the Control Room? Meredith wasn't sure what was going on."

"Eve gave me a proximity alert, so I broke out and headed towards the screeching alarms. When I got there, the Phage scooted, so I had clear access to the crystals. Actually," she tilted her head, considering. "That's not the first time a Phage has...well, run away when I got close. I thought it was because, usually, I've had you and the other big muscle-y guys with guns right behind me, but this time, all it had to do was keep me away from the crystals and then we'd all be dead. There was no reason for it to turn tail like that." Her expression was the definition of befuddled.

"Okay. Don't get all... frustrated. I am about to tell you something that your mother and I kept from you. For very good reason, so use your massive intellect before going off in a sulk. Okay?"

"I promise nothing." She folded her arms and looked through her eye lashes at her father.

"The... the radiation you were exposed to whilst in your mother's uterus, it had side effects."

"Like giving me cancer?" she tried to make light of it, as she always did. "Wait, "effects" plural?"

"Yeah. Another effect is that it... you exude the radiation. In very small amounts, and it isn't exactly the same, the type you exude is harmless to humans. But, it does permeate subspace. And it seems to hurt the Phage, which makes sense as they dwell in subspace, of course. What's odd is that you seem to have some control over it. You exude more of it when you're angry..." he gave a little nervous laugh. "Like now."

"Why didn't you tell me? Who else knows?" she frowned. "You could have used me to make a weapon! I could have fought them off, saved..." She trailed off.

"I know this is how you'd be! You hate being tested, poked and prodded in a lab. It would be your idea of hell! We were trying to protect you! Not to mention that we didn't want you to try running into battle, half cocked and getting yourself killed!"

"Why not! It would be a quicker, less painful way to die!" Izzie yelled back.

"Izz, you don't mean that." He replied in a small voice.

"Maybe I do. But that's beside the point. You need to stop wrapping me in cotton wool. I've been trained in sparring by Teyla and Ronan, in gunmanship by John, in first aid by Uncle Carson. I can handle myself in a battle situation. If you knew that you could help fight you would, no matter what the personal risk. So would Mum. So would everyone I care about, but you expect me to just... what? Hide under my bed?"

"Izzie, you... look, when you're a parent..."

"I'm a big sister, it's practically the same thing."

"It... your mother made me do it!" Rodney complained.

At that, the girl could laugh and it was... not all okay, but better. They could figure a way to sort it out for good when they had stopped the bad guys, saved the day and lived happily ever after, for a little while anyway.

"Eve?" He asked the air. His daughter pulled her creation from her pocket and threw it into the air.

"Hey, it's Grandpa! When did you get here, Gramps? Huh?"

"Eve, will you please not call me that. How many times..."

"At least once more. You are my Grandpa." The glowing orb replied. "Izz was my female creator, making her my mother, and you are her father making you my maternal grandfather. See, it makes sense!"

"Look, just put a sock in it, will you! And could you please hold still for just one second? You're making me dizzy with the acrobatics."

"Awwww, poor old Grandpa!" The orb settled down at eye level. "What can I do you for Grumpy?"

"You can scan for the Phage?" Rodney asked curtly. The E.V.E. always got on his nerves.

"In a manner of speaking. My sensors were affected by the temporal backlash. I can sense that there are two in the city, and I can predict with fair accuracy where they are, but I cannot say for sure unless we go back to our Atlantis and recalibrate my systems."

McKay thought. They had a way of tracking the Phage, with some degree of accuracy at least. And... his daughter was never going to talk to him after this. If she was mad already...

"E.V.E." He said, resignedly. "Special File Zebra. Password Bastille day."

"Special File Zebra retrieved." The orb began listing figures.

"You had her monitor me?" Izzie exclaimed. She folded her arms. "For how long?"

"Since the base was infiltrated by that Phage."

"That was over a year ago!"

"That's when we realised that you had some kind of hold over the Phage. Somehow. Your mother was worried about you, and Beckett wanted more data. So, we asked E.V.E. to keep an eye on you, on the levels of radiation coming from you. It was for your own sake."

"Oh, don't. It was to satisfy your own curiosity." She shook her head as a bitter taste filled her mouth. "You lied to me."

"Yes."

"But, you_ LIED _to _me!"_

"Yes. I'm not sorry. It was to help you. We needed to know you were safe. And if we'd told you... Izz, you know how trusting you are, it's gotten you into trouble before. We didn't want you to end up with the NID."

"I'm not that stupid, Dad." She rolled her eyes.

"I'm not saying you're stupid." He rolled his right back. "But you are a child, and you can be... naive. Sometimes."

"We are going to discuss this when we get past the current crisis." She promised.

"There's something else..."

"Oh, what now!"

"Well, you remember what Carson said about how I haven't aged much?"

"Yeah..."

"Well, that's thanks to you. The radiation has the effect of halting the aging process of anyone who is exposed to it in the long term. We've told the higher ups back on Earth that it's an effect of living in Atlantis, but..."

"I suppose that's what the writings meant. You know, the ones that led you there in the first place?"

"Yeah. Fountain of youth." He snorted. "Not worth the cost."

Then the lights went out.

* * *

The base was in trouble. Systems were going off everywhere, and no one could figure out why or how to stop it.

The father and daughter, with a Tinkerbell light leading the way, broke out of the isolation room.

They walked quickly, but carefully along the corridors, avoiding attention as much as possible. The last thing they needed was to be noticed and sent back to iso before they could talk to the leader of the colony. They heard various conversations, mainly about the time travelling wonder-kid which made Izzie smile a ghost of her old grin. It faded quickly as they heard a man with a pony tail talking loudly to a long suffering friend.

"Two McKay's? That's the last thing I need. One of the man is insufferable as it is! I'm twice the genius that arrogant know it all is. He doesn't deserve to be Head of Science with all the mistakes he makes. And with two of them? The city is doomed! The man has no idea what the word circumspect means!"

"Kavanagh!" Rodney exclaimed under his breath, hands becoming fists.

Then a moment later, she felt her father stop and turned to him. He was staring at a man before him. Luckily the man was deep in conversation with Radek and neither was looking in their direction. She took her father's arm and pulled him after her.

"Dad? What's wrong?"

"That man talking to Radek?" He took a deep breath. "That was Peter Grodin. He dies. And it was my fault. I drew the short straw." He looked lost. She tugged on his arm again but he didn't move, transfixed, staring at the man he'd had to let die.

"Daddy, we need to keep moving, okay?" He still didn't move.

"I really didn't think this whole time travel thing through. It was bad enough seeing Carson. He... I just wanted to help him. But there are so many people. So many who die because I wasn't good enough. It would be so easy... just a few words in the right place and... I could change, save, so many lives..." He trailed off.

"Daddy, you're scaring me. They're going to notice us." At that moment Radek turned and saw them. He grabbed Peter's arm and they both began to head to the escapees. "You aren't God, Dad. You can't change this." She whispered as the men approached.

"Rodney." Radek said in his Czech accent. "And Elizabeth. Are you not supposed to both be in the isolation rooms?"

"Technically? Yes." Rodney answered.

"Do I need to call security?" Peter asked, hand going to radio.

"Peter, come on! We're just going to go and see Dr Weir. It isn't a big deal."

"It would have taken too long to go through the proper channels unless bureaucracy has gotten significantly worse in the future." The girl said. She had her hands wrapped around her father's arm and almost seemed to be supporting him.

"I doubt that could be possible." Peter replied and Radek gave her a smile. She glanced at her father, and he was quite pale and seemed to be worried about something. The Tinkerbell light was darting around them and then suddenly began a shrill noise.

"Quiet, Eve." Izzie said curtly, but her eyes were suddenly wide and nervous. "Look, why don't you two escort us to Dr Weir's office, make sure we don't get into trouble?"

They headed straight to see Elizabeth Weir. She was of course in the control room, as the city's situation had been getting steadily worse as the Phage had infiltrated more and more systems. She had no idea what was going on, but she knew that something was taking over her city and she had to do whatever she could to stop it.

"Elizabeth!" Rodney said as they entered into her office. She was sitting at her desk looking at the latest reports on the worsening situation in the city.

"I thought you were with Radek in your lab." She said before she looked up fully.

"I expect I am." He replied.

"No you aren't" Radek said from behind him. "I am here, remember? You are running around taking readings with an ancient scanner." He and Peter had entered after the fugitives. The leader turned a glare on the accomplices before turning back to the McKay's.

"I thought we had an agreement." Dr Weir responded, giving the girl at her father's side a glare.

"Don't blame her, Elizabeth. Please." He frowned. "It's not her fault. I insisted we had to see you, given the crisis."

"And you couldn't just ask the guards to get me?"

"Where's the fun in that?" McKay asked.

"Just let me..." Weir told them, holding up a finger. She turned on her radio. "Lieutenant Jeffries. You know those 'guests' in the isolation room. The ones you're supposed to be keeping an eye on. Could you explain to me what they are doing in my office?"

She gave them a quick put down and then turned back to the time travelling McKay's.

"Now, could you please explain what on earth is going on?"

* * *

**Hope you're still reading!**


End file.
